gotterdammerung
by dance-at-bougival
Summary: Phase 3: Ragnarok. A year, three years, ten, fifty. In the black silence of deep space, time unfolds like an old tapestry, and he sees visions of what has been and what will be, of what shall perish by his hand, and what the humans will build. Loki Liesmith, the universe whispers and for the first time in his long, long life, he listens. What grand plans we have for you.
1. Chapter 1

**a/n:** _so, this is going to be my first multi-chapter fic, the gist of which shouldn't be too hard to figure out from the title. i'll try and update as i go along, but it won't be a weekly thing - i'll be lucky if i can do it monthly. that said, my ideal marvel phase 3 - here we go._

* * *

Jane Foster's living quarters in the facility was painfully squalid; to call it a shack would be generous. A plain small bed, a few unpacked boxes holding her meagre belongings. The bed, by the looks of it, hasn't been slept in in weeks.

He sweeps a finger across the top of the headboard; his finger comes away coated in dust. Stark's tower had been resplendent with the blue furnishings the mortals consider the height of the tesseract's power, the ground polished until it shone, all of the city spreading out beneath the looming steel monstrosity; some prophets fancy themselves kings, others, like Jane Foster, prefer something akin to a vow of poverty.

When she enters the room, barely awake, the door slams shut behind her of its own accord. It is enough to snap her eyes wide open.

"You escaped." Is the first thing she says. Around them, his magic pulses, trembling with untried potential; oh, in a few short years, this will be child's play. "I don't—"

"I mean you no harm." He says, spreading his hands. That's not entirely true, but it is true enough. It is true enough to serve the purpose at hand; the best lies always have a kernel of truth in its heart. That is a lesson he learnt the hard way. "Thor is quite enamoured with you, Jane Foster." He smiles; a vicious cut of white teeth. "And I would never do anything to endanger my brother's happiness."

He can taste her fear, cold and brittle and metallic on the tip of his tongue. She keeps her careful distance; this is no girl. This is a woman who had travelled to the other end of the universe and had found it wanting, a prophet about to launch humanity to its zenith. There is a keen, bright intelligence in her eyes; cooler than Thor's battle-lust driven strategies, more human than Sif's careful analyses. Her fingers are twitching, rubbing against one another, and she keeps her distance.

"Are you going to kill me?" She asks simply. Forthrightness; how predictable of his brother.

He chuckles. She flinches visibly. "I'm insulted, Doctor Foster. What an artless tactic… no, no. I prefer less permanent solutions to the issue at hand."

Her words are carefully measured. "And what is the issue?"

He smiles.

* * *

He has learnt to appreciate humans, in truth. Their mercurial nature, their caprice; the constant urge to evolve—that is something that he has yearned for, retrospectively. It is only now, at the end of the tunnel, that he can look back and appreciate the incredible vast yawning chasm of humanity; the chasm that they have been racing to fill for upwards of ten thousand years.

Fire; the wheel. The discovery of iron, then steel, then fire powder which lead to all sorts of interesting trappings of death. Playing around with elements gave them the power to order millions of deaths, to create life from scratch, to infuse machines with the ability to think. There is only one more frontier.

What a great difference five short human years makes. It had taken his body twenty times as long to age from boy to man, and in five minuscule years the humans are now poised to take the universe.

Stark and Rogers at odds. War in the streets, SHIELD in disarray, and sides, oh, _sides_ being picked. Five years, and Midgard is ripe for conquest; five years, and the humans are tearing themselves into shreds. Five years, and _chaos_.

Five years, and this time he is ready. He can taste it on his tongue; not victory. Never victory. No. It is something invincible; something absolutely certain, as sure as the death of stars and Yggdrasil itself.

Fate.

"What is the issue?" Jane Foster asks, eyes darting, and he holds out his hands.

"You may restrain me." He says. "And then, Doctor Foster, you may take me to Director Hill."


	2. Chapter 2

They call in Fury.

They don't put him in a glass cage this time. Since he came of his own accord, and the humans—far cleverer and far more devious than his righteous brother could believe, a species more given to cunning than raw, thoughtless bravery—repay him in kind. They put him in an interrogation chamber, a single light swinging from the ceiling. One side of the room is glass; on the other side, he can imagine, stands the good doctor, and a dozen other humans prepared to dissect his every move.

Fury is older than he could have imagined. More lines in his face, though his single eye is no less stern. He pastes a pleasant smile on to his face, folds his hands, and waits.

"What's your game here?" Fury asks, and Hill, on his other side, folds her arms. "You know, when Thor contacted us to say that you've escaped after the battle with what's-his-name, we thought you'd be gone for good. Off to some deep dark corner of space, because you've tried this once and it ended badly for you. So be honest with me, it'll save all of us time. What's your game here?"

He folds his hands carefully over one another. "Malekith. The elven king."

"Do I look like I'm here for some Lord of the Rings shit?" Fury asks, and a flicker of something almost like amusement flits over Hill's face, before her mouth is stoic again. "Why are you here?"

He smiles down at his hands. "Thor had told you I escaped, I see. But I wonder if he told you that it was I who ordered the attack on Asgard by the Dark Elves in the first place."

In the silence afterwards, Fury draws back. He looks up at them, and his lips curve. Yes, _yes_, this is what he had missed. Had they all forgotten what his role was, in the cosmic order? Last time, on earth, his mind had been confused, blurry, in a haze of violence that clouded his judgement. This time, his vision is clear and his tongue is precise, and the future of the universe is written in the shape of his cunning; it could never have been achieved by blind, thoughtless rage. It is like breathing, after being submerged in deep water. His mind is clear, his tongue is ready, his hands are cool and calm and he will accomplish his fate.

"Evidently not." He says finally.

Hill uncrosses her arms. Her voice does not shake; it must not be an easy thing, to live up to the titanic figure that Fury cuts, still, through SHIELD's headquarters. "What do you want?"

"Asylum." He says finally. "From my brother. From my enemies. From your Avengers. From anyone who would seek to do me harm."

"The last time you were here you launched an attack on New York. You caused a civilian casualty of thousands. You abducted and brainwashed several of our own personnel and you almost took the life of another." Hill says. "Why in _hell_ would we grant you sanctuary from our allies?"

He tilts his head, and turns to face the glass wall. "Is Doctor Foster listening, by any chance?"

"Answer the question."

"The reparation of the Bifrost proved a vastly successful innovation; an innovation that I myself did not foresee. Likewise, the innovation of Stark's suit, of the countless inventions that you humans have gleaned from the power of the tesseract; quite impressive for a species that have progressed from beating each other with sticks in the mud to space travel within ten thousand years—"

"Is there a point to this?" Fury snapped. "Or should I go have my lunch and come back when you've finished your supervillain monologue?"

He almost wants to laugh. He is almost giddy. "Asgard is not the only jewel of the universe." He says instead. "I have read your books. I have studied your politics and I know what dangerous peril your earth is in. Truth be told, this planet is too small for your species' ambitions. Much like Stark—you will find that your mortal bodies are too small and too slow and too frail for the reality you wish to manifest." He leans forward, and the two directors of SHIELD flinch back. "Your poverty. Your lack of supplies. The growing issue of pollution. A population at eight billion and growing; your wars, your slaughter, your senseless violence. Your lack of options, simply, should you choose to stay on this planet."

Jane Foster is staring at him. He can feel it; he imagines her small hand clutched to her mouth, imagines her heart in her throat, her wide eyes. He smiles. "I can offer you a solution. And I want asylum in return."

"You've offered us nothing but words," Hill says. "Unless you give us something more, we'll give you nothing."

Fury flicks a glance over to her. What was the phrase that he had stumbled upon so many times while memorizing their system? _We don't negotiate with terrorists._ He smiles. "I'll give you two things. The two most powerful artefacts in the universe."

On the other side of the wall, Jane Foster is tensing. Hill lifts an eyebrow, but her eyes are bright and clear and she is ready.

"I'll give you the tesseract." He says. "And I shall bestow upon you, as a ceremonial gift from the Last Prince of Jotunnheimr, the Casket of Ancient Winters."

* * *

Trapped behind the white vaults at the far end of Odin Allfather's chamber of stolen relics, the Destroyer stands, ready and calm and completely unthinking, dictated by all the laws of Asgard and the faultless physics of the elders to protect and serve and destroy.

Storeys above it, hundreds of meters away in the soaring skies of Asgard, Chitauri flit down in dark, raging swarms. A black rain is falling and falling and falling from the skies, an army without compare and an army without end, dirtying the golden realm with filth; with the immeasurable black space between stars. Blood is running free and clear in the streets, women and children and common men—Aesir, all; who had thought their realm impenetrable, who had bought into the lie that their realm was indeed eternal—slain like chattel. Their screams echo through the streets and down the halls, and it is a reminder that yes, time comes even to the Realm Eternal.

He finds his father in the Hall of Kings.

His steps echo, steady and calm and sure against the bronze floors. The very ground itself is imprinted with a memory not yet aged, a memory of being marched down this very length, with Thor's hand at his back, the nobles in silent, taut rows around them. A memory of being forced to his knees at the base of the throne, and having his every cell picked open and stripped clean.

"Allfather," he says. The sworn warriors on Odin's sides cannot have been older than him, cannot even be half his age. A few years in training, less than a dozen battles to their name. He had heard reports that in Malekith's attack and in the subsequent battle, Asgard lost more than three quarters of its experienced warriors. How the mighty have fallen; has the Allfather begun to pick clean the nurseries for flesh and blood shields?

They rush at him; ten, fifteen, twenty. It does not matter. He is Loki, Destroyer of Worlds. Loki, Conqueror. Loki, whose Silvertongue is by no means the greatest of his skills. He is Loki, the Hand of Fate.

When it is done, there is blood—not his—running down the front of his breast plate, a cut on his cheek, his hands are red. His sceptre beneath his fingers is slick with sweat and with the blood of slaughtered youth. Odin does not even flinch.

"I did not come to kill children." He says, and flings out a hand. His magic wracks the hall, ice spreading from his fingers, coating the ground and rushing up the high, soaring walls in a spread of cold. The great double doors are forced shut, with all the might of Jotunnheimr's winter behind it. Odin's breath is coming out white. He steps over the body of a boy who had fought particularly valiantly, and then again, again, he is at the base of the throne, he is looking up at the father who had raised him and lied to him and killed him. "I came for you."

Odin is older than he remembers. His hair entirely white now, the lines at the corners of his mouth and his eyes are clear and hard, as if someone had taken to him with a scalpel. His throat is frail and thin and beneath his golden chestplate, beneath his red cloak, beneath the trappings of his ceremonial armour, he is just an old man. He is just a fragile man in the twilight of his years, wearing the cambric nightgown that his wife had stitched for him, thread by painstaking thread.

"You will not have me, my boy." And he laughs. The night is clear and ringing with the screams of his subjects, and the Allfather deigns to sit here and play at heroics. "I am a king. I will not be subject to your petty wrath."

"Are you, Allfather?" He asks, and he is at a level with Odin. "Are you a king? Shh, listen." He cups an ear. Something twitches in Odin's face, as if he is suppressing a flinch. "How can you be a king, without a kingdom? How can you call yourself a king when your subjects are slaughtered like chattel in the streets? I've often wondered how your delusions have kept you alive. How many titles you've held on to, simply because _you_ believe you deserve them, despite all evidence to the contrary."

"Loki—"

"King. Diplomat. Peacemaker. Allfather." He looks down at his sceptre, traces a finger over its ancient designs. When he looks up, his eyes are clear. "_Father_."

Odin's eyes close for a fraction of a second too long. "You are my son. You have always been my son. No matter what you believe, no matter what agendas you have heaped on my head over the years, you were my son. I loved you then and I love you now, and nothing you can do will change that."

"You told me once that you took me so you could unite Asgard and Jotunnheimr." He does not even react to Odin's words. His heart has long been hardened against this particular sentiment. An easy movement, and the blade of his sceptre is resting on Odin's chest. "I am asking you again: why did you take me? See if you can tell the truth this time."

The silence during which Odin realizes his great mistake is small. A few seconds, nothing more and nothing less. Smaller things have hinged on longer moments, and he watches as understanding dawns in Odin's eyes. He watches as the old man realizes, finally, that you cannot run from fate. That destiny cannot be cheated.

The old man gives up. Odin Allfather, ruler of a realm rotten at the core, who had been a king for half his life, a father for a quarter and a liar for all eternity, simply gives up.

"I took you because I saw what you would do." He says finally. "I took you because I saw your fate in the Well of Wyrd. I saw Asgard burning and all the universe reduced to darkness, and so I took you. A futile effort, it seemed."

His hands are shaking. There is bile at the back of his throat, and his vision swims, but he keeps his sceptre steady on Odin's chest, and he keeps his grip. This is it. Do not falter. Do not hesitate.

"Give yourself some credit," he says, and wills his voice to be flat and calm. "It was hardly futile. You've fulfilled your duty. Now I am going to fulfil mine."

He readies himself for the killing blow, and Odin's hand is on his wrist. The old man's eyes are still as blue as they ever were, still impassive, still steady. Loki wonders, suddenly, if Odin wants this. If he had dreamed, had prayed for this. If he had simply been so tired of this stagnant kingdom that he would welcome death with open arms if it allowed him to sleep.

"Fate, not worth." Odin says, and then the blade is in his heart.

* * *

The Destroyer is trapped behind its white vault, storeys beneath them. As he breathes hard, as the old man's corpse hits the ground and he sits, for a brief moment, on the throne of Asgard, the vaults beneath him is thankfully silent.

Two apparitions with his body and his face appear in the vaults. One grasps a casket, the other a cube.

The Destroyer had been a dwarven creation, infused with Odin's magic, that would awake at the call of Asgard's king.

And now there is no king. Now, the Destroyer stands silent and immobile behind its trapping, and in a blur, the two apparitions disappear, their stolen relics with them.

Loki, on the throne, closes his eyes as the doors at the far end of the hall begins to struggle, as he hears his brother's panicked, anguished yell on the other side.

"Father!" Thor is screaming. "_Father_!"

He wills his hands to stop shaking.

A whisper, a hiss; gone.

* * *

The humans find the tesseract fifty miles off the coast of Guam, almost seven miles beneath sea level.

The casket they find in a vault in the Swiss Bank.

Two weeks after his first interrogation, Hill comes back, and this time she is alone.

She sits down opposite him, and her eyes are clear. "We're listening."


	3. Chapter 3

In the days of Jotunheimr's might, when winter and cold and the frosted hearts of her ice kings ruled the far side of the universe, when Odin himself had been a child in a cradle and Asgard a faraway dream, the wise men of all the worlds had made pilgrimages to the roots of Yggdrasil in their quests to become ever wiser.

This is what Odin had erased from the golden histories, from the shimmering books—that Jotunheimr had been great before Asgard had ever been conceived, that in the dawn of all ages, in the beginning of all stories, it is the cold of the universe that all things are born from. From darkness we come; and to darkness we shall go.

He wakes screaming.

The girl with the golden hair is gone, her crude wooden bowl with her. His breath is coming quick, the air puffing white and high above him, he sees the single gleam of the drop of moisture, balanced on the precipice of the rock; ready to fall.

The light pierces it; comes out the other side refracted into a dozen colours. When it lands in his open eye, his mind goes blank.

_Wake up._

_Wake up._

_Fate_, the universe whispers. _Not worth._

* * *

"I called your people ants, once." He says now, and Hill's thin smile curves beneath the harsh glare of the swinging light. The cuffs around his hands clink lightly as he sprawls in his seat.

She stares at him for a moment, mouth shadowed, and he supposes that this is what comes with inheriting Fury's empire—the stillness that follows the storm, the calm that precedes the wave. "And are you admitting your mistake?"

"Quite the contrary," he says softly. He smiles, making sure to show his teeth. It's a sign of submission, he had read in one of their books. "The comparison proved true, though not in the way that I had meant for it to."

Hill tilts her head. "How so? Small and barely sentient?"

He smiles again; ducks his head in something almost like bashful sheepishness. He has not employed this trick since he was a boy. The chains are made of some high density rock, half organic, half manufactured—no doubt in one of Stark's labs. He traces a finger over the metal, thinks that Thor could break these chains with Mjolnir in seconds. He does not need as much time. "Did you know that a single ant can lift ten times its weight?" Overhead, the light swings. Through the glass window, he imagines the camera with its red light, perhaps zooming in on his finger tracing circles on the silver table. Later, their healers will analyse these findings; try to find a fissure of insecurity or a back door into his mind. "Twelve years before my ill-advised invasion of your city, your people found a colony of ants that contained billions of worker ants and millions of queens, spread along six thousand kilometres of Mediterranean coastline. That trumps the earlier discovery of a colony of more than three million workers and one million queens, over an area of seven hundred acres."

Hill's fingers are tapping on the table. "I didn't know you were interested in myrmecology—that's what it's called, right? The study of ants. I didn't know you were interested in this planet at all."

"Oh, I've developed quite an interest in myrmecology." He replies. "And anthropology—is that what you call it, the study of humans? In Asgard itself, we call it patronage. We fancy ourselves gods, you see."

She is on a time limit. She is almost afraid. He watches the pulse jump in her throat. "And what," she asks softly, "is the link between myrmecology and anthropology?"

"Perspective." The word hangs in between them, and then he smiles. When he leans forward, movement a sinuous curl of his body, she flinches back. "From a great enough height, all things look to be ants, but there's the rub, Director Hill—there is no place on earth with the exception of Antarctica that does not have a population of these small industrious creatures. They have successfully colonized every inhabitable place on your planet, through unification, through work, through cooperation; through a single minded, unrelenting will to climb out of the dirt. They are the most minimal creatures on earth, yet they have a kingdom larger than any lion dare dream."

He smiles, lifts his hands in something almost like supplication before he slides the chains across the table. They clink to a stop in front of Hill. "I would ask you where to from now," he says. "But I think you already know the answer."

He does not need to say anymore. Three days later he is assigned his own chambers. Inside, Jane Foster is waiting on his couch.

* * *

"You know something." Is the first thing she says. He smiles. She is a little thing—smaller than most Midgardians, even, smaller than that redheaded woman the agents call Spider. Her eyes are bright, however. There is something innocent in her craving for the dark space between stars, something easy and simple; something about her that reminds him of himself as a boy, so many centuries ago. She has not yet learnt to use her knowledge like knives—she has not yet desired more than knowledge.

"I know a great deal of things," he says. "I know of the last words uttered by the last Jotun king as he looked into the face of his killer. I know of the exact mechanics the Elders calculated to construct the Bifrost. I know of the weight and hum and song of my dear brother's hammer, and how to cut it loose—I know a great deal of things, Dr Foster, and I have paid dearly for my knowledge. The same cannot be said for you."

He is thinking of a well. He is thinking of a shattered rock, a single protruding shard from which all knowledge fell, he is thinking of a girl with golden hair. He is thinking of a hundred thousand years in the abyss.

"You're planning something." She says. "There's something you're not telling us."

"Too vague." He retorts, and sits in the seat opposite her. "You must specify, Dr Foster, else I simply do not know what you're speaking of."

"Why?" She asks simply. "The last time you were here—"

"The last time I was here, I was not thinking." He cuts her off before she could finish. "The last time I was here, I was what your healers would classify as 'clinically insane'. To destroy such an earth, to render you all slaves…" he smiles, and the woman flinches back visibly. "Would have been _such_ a waste."

The next question is obvious. "What changed your mind?"

The answer is simple as well. "I assume you were listening when I talked to the Director. Despite everything else, I must assure you I was telling the truth—there's a certain industry and single-mindedness that I find admirable about humanity. I don't fancy that you're all saints; you will find, Dr Foster, that I don't often make my brother's mistakes." Another smile, a brutal slash of teeth. "Recent instances notwithstanding."

"Don't do that." She says. "Don't try that with me." Her voice drops, consciously and with a careful purpose; too low for the bugs in the apartment to pick up. "I'm not Hill. I'm not Fury. I don't care what you give them, what _ceremonial gift_ we receive. I don't care about Stark and I don't care about Rogers and I don't care what bill they're trying to pass in Congress. What I care about is what you're planning—" she pauses and stare had at him, when he bites down on his tongue to hold back a laugh. "These objects have a _scent_," she hisses. "I know that. Hill knows that. Fury knows it and you, of all people know it."

"And yet." He says. It is not a question.

"And yet—" Jane Foster is breathing fast. "And yet, I want you to tell me why when I ran the tests in the lab two days ago there was no radiation. I want you to tell me what you did."

"I'm insulted you would think I would be as artless as all that—use the tesseract as bait for invaders? It didn't work out so well last time." He smiles down at his hands. "I gave you a gift." He says softly. "A gift without strings attached; and gifts of this sort come only once or twice in a lifetime, Jane Foster. I would thank you not to question it."

"But I have to, don't I?" She replies, a hard glint in her eyes. "I have to, because you don't do anything without a purpose. Because you don't set anything up without expecting profit." She leans forward. "You didn't really think we wouldn't catch on, did you?"

"You'd have to elaborate."

"New York." She says. "It was a ploy, wasn't it?"

He stops.

"You always intended to get caught." She says, eyes widening. "You were always meant to be defeated."

The smile on his face is unfeigned, and he feels mirth bubbling up inside of him—_oh_, she is positively _squandered_ on his oaf of a brother. "You overestimate my abilities, my dear Doctor."

"That was the plan from the get go, wasn't it?" She asks. "Otherwise why wait? Why give us a chance at all, there were a thousand ways it could have gone wrong, and, for God's sakes, ego only goes for so far before it turns into stupidity, and _you're not stupid,_ so why, _why_, unless that was the plan? Unless all you wanted out of earth was a ticket back to Asgard?"

He grins; stands. "Would you like a drink?"

* * *

"Do you love my brother?" He asks, when his insides are comfortably warm. The ale isn't as strong as he would have liked, too watery, something uncomfortably cloying at the back of his throat.

Jane Foster, on the other hand, hasn't touched her drink.

"Your brother is a good man."

My brother is a _god_, he thinks viciously and something about the set of his face must have revealed his thoughts, because Foster's knuckles are suddenly white, curling around the crook of her arm. He is being indiscreet.

My brother is a _god_, he thinks. How he plays the big dumb muscle when he feels the whim to—these humans had not seen him when he had levelled cities and slayed monsters the size of the skies, they had not seen the sheer scope of his wrath. Thor, the Thunderer; Thor, the Light-bringer; Thor, the giant of Asgard. Bow or be crushed.

"When it suits him." He replies lightly, and takes another swig. The human clothes they gave him are light and breathable, lazy and thin—peasants' clothes. He sprawls his legs easily.

Foster's eyes flash. "He's a good guy." She snaps. "He's not a murdering genocidal tyrant, for one."

His mouth curls. He is thinking of a boy, who had vowed with all the conviction of a storm, of hunting monsters, of following in his father's footsteps. He is trying not to blink. "We all have our faults," he says instead. "Has he ever told you of what shall become of this dalliance of yours?"

She is silent.

"The Asgardian genome, your scientists tell me, does age. The Jotun one as well. However, due to differences in environment, in bone density and muscular make up and all that tripe—I'm sure you're more knowledgeable than me in that matter—it ages very, _very_ slowly. At fifty times the human rate, in fact—in the time it took for Odin Allfather to age not-so-gracefully from the height of his power to his current aging decay, your people had conquered the planet and ventured into space. In fifty years you will be old and grey, and my brother would have only aged a year." He grins around the top of his ale bottle. "That should be very interesting indeed."

"I'm not here to talk _boys_ with you," Jane Foster retorts. "I have Darcy for that. I'm here to talk about you, and about what plan you have in the works."

"How will he muster that, I wonder?" He murmurs. "He has still not learnt the lesson fully, has he, Dr Foster? That some things cannot be beaten into submission. Order. Nature. Fate." He blinks, and he is staring at the wall behind Jane Foster's head. "Some things must be endured."

She is quiet.

"You may not be able to answer the question, but I can tell you that he loves you." He says finally, never removing his eyes from the wall. "Thor loves you as he loves all things; with all of his big, stupid heart." He bares his teeth. "It's just a lump of muscle, I'd told him once. It's just a piece of meat. And meat is simply. So. _Breakable_."

_This heart, _he had thought, so long ago in a golden room, _will be the end of you._

Her face is blank. "Are you speaking from experience?"

The ale pauses on the way to his mouth.

"Your brother told me," she says lightly. "When I was there, on Asgard—you wouldn't remember, of course—of all the things you did as boys. How you taught him how to see shapes in the stars. The snow you'd make in the throne room. All the magic you'd use to chase away your tutors."

He takes a long swig of his drink. His fingers are tight around the bottle.

"And he told me of all the things you two had planned as boys—how only one of you will sit in the throne, but both of you will rule." Jane Foster's large brown eyes are watching him intently, and oh, he knows this trick. He has used it well and abandoned it, but still. No matter how blunt the knife, given enough time it will definitely draw blood. "To unite Asgard and Jotunheimr, bring the universe into a new age of enlightenment; he always thought you'd be by his side, you know." She looks down, and her laugh is mirthless. "Sif told me that after you fell from the Bifrost, Thor used to spend nights awake pacing the halls. She'd always find him in your room in the mornings." Her eyes are clear when she looks up. "Is that what you mean by the whole diatribe about the heart? Because you're right. Meat is just so fragile."

He realizes, in a daze, that his hands are shaking.

"Enough about sentiments long past." He says quietly, once he's gathered himself enough to reply. His voice is unsure and unsteady, he wills his body to stand still, as taut as the string of a bow. "Didn't you have questions to ask me? Ask away. I'll answer. Make it quick, Doctor. You've overstayed your welcome."

His heart is hammering inside his chest, and it must be the alcohol, it must be, because this was not the deal he had made with the Well. His heart is hammering in his chest, a phantom presence ramming against his ribcage like an imprisoned man, and gods, _no, no, no, no, no—_

"Tell me why you think we're going to help you do whatever you've got planned." Jane Foster says. "And while you're at it, tell me what you've got planned."

The rest of the ale goes down his throat in one rush, and he sets it down on the table with a loud crack. The human flinches.

"I want you to build a ship." He says finally, and stares the woman dead in the eyes. "I want you to send a message. Now get out."


End file.
